I Pass The Night Watchman On His Beat
by TrisakAminawn
Summary: Officer Grayson expresses some opinions. His partner is amused. Paperwork is endless. Police work is hard, and the rewards can be slim, and Grayson's secrets have nothing to do with Internal Affairs. [Featuring Amy Rohrbach.]


I Pass the Night Watchman On His Beat

I am not DC comics. Title paraphrased from a popular Frost poem, because nyah. T rating is for a couple of casual curse words. This would be under 'Nightwing,' except Rohrbach isn't a listable character in that category _either_, so I'll just keep all my batfamily fics together. Anyone waiting for more 'Roofs of Uncertainty,' it's almost there. In the meantime, have some Dick.

* * *

It was eight o'clock at night, halfway through the evening shift, when Officer Grayson of the Bludhaven Police dropped into his seat in a deserted corner of the bullpen and flopped forward onto his desk, atop half-organized stacks of paperwork. He'd caught three hours of sleep in the last two days, thanks to his two jobs, and now Redhorn was busting his ass about not 'bringing in the numbers.'

They couldn't say 'meeting quota,' because quotas for policing were now illegal in this state, but there was a quota, and Dick was not making it, because he was only going to hassle people for being suspicious if they were _actually_ being suspicious, dammit, and arresting people wasn't always the best option even when you had charges you could press. Going to prison just made it harder to go straight in the long term, after all. But Redhorn didn't give a jam donut about any of that. He wanted obedience, activity numbers, and plenty of extra cash to line his pockets. Officer Grayson's career as an honest upstanding cop was not looking bright.

"Well, I'm never going to be Commissioner Gordon," Dick muttered into the paperwork.

"What's that? You shooting for Commissioner, rookie?" Corporal Amy Rohrbach was too good a woman to be _quite_ jeering at him, but she came pretty close as she sat down at her adjoining desk. She'd softened a little over the two months they'd been working together; she'd probably concluded that at least he wasn't the usual grade of corrupt, though she probably now thought he was reporting to IA.

Rohrbach had been about to make Lieutenant for the third time, before being busted down to Corporal again and assigned to work with a new officer as punishment for not falling in line with unofficial policy. She was getting a reputation as a mudraker, which was making a hash of her career. She had two kids at home, and she was honorable and smart. She should be a Captain already. He could see why she resented him.

Dick raised his head to shoot a bashful, boyish grin at her. "Nah, I—" There was a second cup of coffee next to her own at the edge of her desk, which she pushed toward him when he saw it. "You are a goddess among women," he proclaimed, seizing it and taking a large, too-hot swallow. Four sugars, no milk. He had gotten so lucky in his partner.

When he lowered the cup, she was still looking expectant. "It's not that I want to be Commissioner," he clarified. Command responsibility, ick. He'd had enough of that by the time he turned twenty. That was how he'd wound up here, alone. He never wanted anyone to die while following his orders again. "But you know I'm from Gotham? I always really looked up to Gordon. It's why I got into police work."

Amy was doing the flat stare thing she did when she wanted a suspect to keep talking. Ten years on the force, she couldn't turn it off any more than Bruce really could, even though he faked it pretty well. It was oddly comfortable to be around. "I hear he was a good cop," she said. "Then again, I also hear he was an incompetent ass-kisser who depends on the Batman for everything."

"He's competent," Dick corrected. "And he always tells it like he sees it. He pulled the Gotham PD from practically another gang of thugs fifteen years ago up to where people mostly _trust_ them now, even in a lot of the low-rent neighborhoods." He had to be careful not to say too much; Amy didn't know a lot about his background, but he couldn't seem more knowledgeable about the state of Gotham's police than a kid who'd lived in town through most of the transition should be, allowing for an established interest in cops.

"Fanboy," she teased. She'd grabbed a stack of six chocolate-chip cookies from the box someone had left by the coffee machine, and bit one in half as he sputtered.

"Gordon never compromised," he said finally, once his obligatory indignation was discharged. "But he still got promoted."

"Batman," Rohrbach suggested.

"Probably helped," Dick allowed, sipping his sweet, sweet coffee. Bruce had trusted Gordon, so he'd let him in on a lot of major operations. It had boosted the man's reputation considerably. He grinned. "Maybe I should form an alliance with this Nightwing."

His partner fixed him with a look. "That's a kind of corruption too, Grayson. Don't go there on my watch." Well, there went his idea of liaising through Rohrbach; he couldn't actually afford to use himself, even if he'd really wanted to boost his own career through illegal extracurriculars. He raised his hands in surrender.

Rohrbach passed him a cookie as a peace offering and finished the one she'd started, as she began to sort through her urgent paperwork. "If you think so much of Gordon, why aren't you serving under him?"

"Can't," Dick replied, shoving the cookie into his mouth whole and shuffling around his desk for a working pen. He chewed a few times before adding a somewhat muffled, "Gotham is Bruce Wayne's city."

Amy forgot her reports to stare at him as he swallowed. Only just kept her voice low. "You had to leave Gotham because you picked a fight with _Bruce Wayne?_"

"Something like that," Dick allowed, not looking her in the eye as he scribbled hopefully in a margin with a pen that left nothing but grooves. Twisted away to toss it into a bin. He didn't think he'd exactly _picked_ anything; their last fight had sort of been born fully grown, the offspring of the last hundred. He couldn't have said who had started it or even entirely what it had been about. It had been final, though.

"And he'd interfere with your career if you tried to work in Gotham?" Rohrbach was openly incredulous.

Dick snorted. "_So_ much." Gotham was _his,_ after all. He'd jerk Dick around however he wanted. Have him assigned to cases Bruce wanted easy access to, have him assigned places he was less likely to get shot or have to pull his sidearm, possibly even get him promoted more easily, if just by indicating to Gordon some evening that young Grayson was a man worth watching. Then there was the fact that the GCPD would have caught on to Dick Grayson's connection with Bruce Wayne much, much faster, even if he'd disappeared from media coverage of the Prince of Gotham a few years ago. (And the tabloid speculation about _that_ had been just charming.) Eventually, he knew, someone in Bludhaven would work out he was _that_ Richard Grayson. Not going to be fun.

His partner shook her head. "He always seemed so harmless."

Dick chuckled. A lot of work went into making her think that, but it was still funny. Bruce, harmless. Not in a million years. "There's a lot more to that guy than he lets on. Aha!" He had found a functioning pen, and addressed himself to the topmost report. "Hey, did Rawlins call me a fucktard while we were cuffing him, or something even stupider?"

"He called you a half-assed sad-sack fucktoy, Grayson."

Dick smirked. "Think he thinks you're a cradle robber, Corporal?"

"Put a sock in it, brat." They worked on their reports in silence for a little while, and then Rohrbach remarked, "You do handle it well."

"Huh?"

She didn't look up. "Most new guys have a hard time keeping their tempers when suspects get provocative. I've seen police brutality that was just some kid not being able to take any more shit about his mother."

Dick shrugged. He could hardly explain he'd been shrugging that kind of thing off every day for over ten years, since before he was old enough to even understand what there was to get angry about in some of the slurs. "Well, my family were performers," he said instead. "When I was little, I dealt with crowds a lot, and crowds can get nasty. I guess I just see it as another form of heckling, really."

Rohrbach chuckled. "Water off a duck?"

"Right."

She rolled her eyes and checked a box. "Make sure you don't spell Esplonteur Street wrong again, rookie. It's embarrassing."

He grinned at her, braid of pale red hair falling forward over one shoulder, glowering a 10-92-C into submission. Sometimes she reminded him so much of Babs, if she was fifteen years older and had passed the GCPD minimum height requirement. Wished he could introduce them. (A moment's thought of Kori, her hair like flame, closed away before he had to face it. Too much pain there, still.) He'd always been lucky in his mentors. "No, ma'am."

"Eyes on your work, Grayson."

"Yes ma'am."

"Don't think you're fooling me."

"Of course not, ma'am."

Their pens scratched. Coffee sloshed. From somewhere a few walls away came the muffled sound of Captain Redhorn yelling at someone, and up at the front of the room, somebody's drunk and disorderly was demanding to be read his rights, even though nobody had any intention of interrogating him. Amy ate another cookie. In about an hour, they'd go out and try to keep the streets safe, and not get shot, and in the morning the sun would rise, and they could go home and sleep a little. And really, there were much worse lives to live than this.

* * *

Some of my details may be off, but things like Redhorn's corruption, Amy's problems being honest in a dirty system, and Dick's dissolving the Titans because people died on his watch are (preboot) canon, as is his painful breakup with Starfire. I use New York laws for the Gotham-Bludhaven area because they might as well be there as anywhere, especially considering NYC flickers in and out of existence in this universe, and I know those laws best.

Originally this was just about how Dick _has_ to have been thinking of Gordon when he decided to try being a cop, especially someplace like Bludhaven. Gordon rocks. The not-quotas business at the beginning references the real-world situation with the NYPD stop & frisk policy. Thoughts? I always love and cherish every review very much.


End file.
